we're heading into day three of president trump's impeachment trial and it's the final day for democrats to lay out the case against the president. yesterday they focused on abuse of power. today they're going to turn their attention to obstruction of congress. before trump's legal team begins their arguments, democrats are already trying to undercut an element of the president's defense by addressing the corruption allegations against joe biden and his son hunter. as we head closer to the iowa caucuses, there is reporting for former presidential candidate kamala harris weighing a possible endorsement of the former vice

president joe biden. good friday morning, everybody. >> we made it to the end of the week. >> we're not actually there yet. >> i was going to say, it doesn't feel like the end of the week, since we're about to go into another crazy weekend with the news. >> and we have all day saturday as the republicans begin their arguments. i'm yasmin vossoughian alongside ayman mohyeldin, it's the third and final day for democratic prosecutors to make the case for president trump's impeachment. during the argument yesterday, democrats hammered on the idea that president trump put his own political interests ahead of american national security. >> president trump acted corruptly. he abused the power of his office by ordering u.s. diplomats to work with his political agent to solicit two politically motivated investigations by ukraine. neither investigation solicited by president trump had anything to do with promoting u.s.

foreign policy or u.s. national security. president trump did not just break the law. he jeopardized our national security. because ukraine's national security is our national security. how? because a free and democratic ukraine is a shield against russian aggression in europe. >> on the basis of this russian propaganda, he withheld 400 million in military aid to a nation russia was fighting, our ally. we ask about, okay, what's the national security implication of what the president did. how much more clear can it be that he's not only pushing russian propaganda, that he's not only misleading americans about who interfered in the last

election, that he's not only doing the kremlin a favor, but that he's withholding aid from a nation at war. >> now, in their arguments yesterday, democratic prosecutors also discussed ukrainian president zelensky's perspective and the reasons he might have felt pressure to comply with president trump's demand to investigate his political rivals. >> ukraine is a fragile democracy under relentless attack from russian backed separatists in the east, so when president trump asked for a favor on july 25th call, he knew that president zelensky would feel incredible pressure to do exactly what president trump wanted. president trump refused to schedule that oval office meeting until the ukrainian leader announced the phony political investigations that he demanded on july 25th. president trump exploited that desperation for his own

political benefit. >> president zelensky tried different ways to resist the pressure of becoming a pawn in u.s. politics. president trump exercised his official power when he withheld an oval office meeting that was critical to ukraine. and he did this for only one reason and one reason only, president trump conditioned that oval office meeting on ukraine announcing investigations that would help him politically. this had nothing to do with official u.s. policy. >> and in their closing arguments last night, house democrats laid out their reasons for why removing the president from office is an urgent matter. >> now, you may be asking how much damage can he really do in the next several months until the election? a lot. a lot of damage. now, we just saw last week a

report that russia tried to hack or maybe did hack burisma. can you have the least bit of confidence that donald trump will stand up to them and protect our national interests over his own personal interest? you know you can't. which makes him dangerous to this country. you know you can't. you know you can't count on him. none of us can. you can trust he will do what's right for donald trump. he'll do it now. he's done it before. he'll do it for the next several months. he'll do it in the election if he's allowed to. this is why if you find him guilty, you must find that he should be removed. >> no president has ever used his office to compel a foreign nation to help him cheat in our

elections. prior presidents would be shocked to the core by such conduct. and rightly so. >> and republicans in the senate are beginning to weigh in on democratic prosecutors arguments on day two of the impeachment trial. heavily criticizing lead prosecutor adam schiff's argument, a spokesperson for senator ben sasse says ben isn't thinking about politics during adam schiff's clown show, he's doing his job by listening and taking notes even when schiff repeats himself over and over and over again. ted cruz slammed democratic prosecutors, our 23 redundant impeachment arguments, for those following at home, drinking game every time house dems say drug deal or get over it, drink a shot of milk. and a series of tweets writing in part, adam schiff is hailing alexander vindman as a patriot,

how patriotic is it to criticize our great nation in front of russia. vindman's attorney hit back writing in a statement quote that a member of the senate at a moment the senate is undertaking its most solemn responsibility would choose to take to twitter to spread slander about a member of the military, senator black burn fires off tweets, vindman will continue to do what he has done, serve our country with duty and honor. president trump commented during an rnc dinner in florida, referring to the entire process as impeachment light, and argued what he is now experiencing is nothing compared to the dark days of president richard nixon and the watergate scandal. >> we're certainly not hearing from the senators on the senate floor. we are definitely hearing from them on twitter. not holding back necessarily. >> just like a normal juror would. >> exactly. joining us onset, msnbc legal analyst, danny cevallos, former u.s. attorney for the district

attorney, and joyce vance, full house. appreciate you coming in with us on this important day. >> making your "first look" debut. >> i think one other time. >> in person. >> yeah. give us your biggest moment, joyce, from yesterday, something that really stood out to you. >> i think the biggest moment and danny, i'm not sure if you'll agree with me, but it was the closing argument that adam schiff gave where he told the senate floor you all know that he's guilty, right, and then he talked about assuming that we all know that he's guilty, what comes next. that maybe is sa little ba leap. there will be no republicans publicly acknowledging that, but in that moment of silence on the floor of the senate, i think everyone understood that, and we see it this morning. none of these arguments are about guilt. they're about process or politics. they're not about the evidence. >> it seems even trump's defense is not to kind of combat the evidence. it's more to combat that it's not impeachable. >> exactly right, ayman.

and i agree with what joyce said, the closing arguments were very compelling and that's actually going to be the defense. it's going to be a yeah, that's true, but so what. it's legal for the president to do what he did so why would we look at the motives, and i can't help but think that that's not really a very coherent argument because we have so many crimes in our criminal code that criminalize something that is otherwise lawful if done with a bad motive but that is what the defense is going to fall back on. they're going to say that because president trump has this article ii power to root out corruption, just because he happened to hone in on one particular person who just so happens to be the son of a political rival, that's still okay as long as there was any scintilla of corruption. i think that's what we're going to end up seeing. i think the democrats, the house managers did a very good job of building their case and addressing in advance the defense's case, which is a very effective tool because then when they stand up, the defense

stands up with all of this, you know, passion, it's going to come in with a wimper. >> joyce, i want to get your take on the presentation of the hunter biden/joe biden burisma story line, and basically saying this is why it doesn't hold water. do you think by even addressing it on the senate floor gives republicans kind of ammunition to say this thing does hold water and gives them the chance to say, well, if we're going to call witnesses here, we want to call hunter biden and we want to call former vice president joe biden to the senate floor to testify? >> you know, this is a strategic decision that you almost always have to make as a prosecutor, right, are you going to address the defenses or wait for the defendant to raise them. here everybody knew that this was coming. hunter biden was always going to be invoked by the republicans, and i think it's smart of the democrats to go ahead and take it on, to put the facts out there, because on the time line, it's clear that there was no corruption. whether or not there was bad business judgment is something that business ethics, experts

can debate. but in terms of pure legality and justification for the president of the united states who after all could have had the justice department investigate, he didn't need to go to the ukrainians, right, didn't need to signal out the one company that happened to have involvement from a political opponent, so i think the democrats they hadded of democrats headed off. they do a good job of that. ultimately whether it happens is in question. >> how do you feel when you as prosecutors hear members of the jury come out and say the statements they have been saying and demonstrating no impartiality like they were instructed to do by the chief justice of the supreme courtm. t it's got to be painful as a lawyer to watch that happen and no one is following the rules, and aside from people getting up, reading a book, cross word puzzles. >> i think it's painful as an american to see people take an oath of impartiality and sort of

shred it immediately. yasmin and i were having this conversation. senators aren't really jurors, right, they're sort of amped up jurors, they have a certain ability to decide what the law is and what the process is, that typical criminal trial jurors do not have. nonetheless, their inherent inability to set aside plolitic, even to listen to the evidence, to weigh the evidence fairly. that should be disturbing to all of us. >> danny, we can go so far as to say, it seems misleading to the american public to identify these senators as jurors at this point when they have been completely forthcoming from the get go, from the start, from the jump of all of this, which way they stand, and which way they're likely going to vote. the majority of them, aside from four or five, that could vote in another direction if the tide changes. >> they're not jurors, and this was an issue that was addressed via objection during the clinton impeachment trial. one of the senators stood up and objected that they were being called jurors because they are, as joyce said, so much more than

jurors. they are the folks with the sole power to try an impeachment case, so they are both juror, they are judges, they are in a sense they exceed what we would normally expect for jurors. >> they're making their own rules in some of these cases with the senate majority leader, they decide what rules they want to vote for. >> in what article iii trial would the jurors be able to overrule the justice, the judge presiding over the trial, that makes them very unique. >> i know this isn't a normal criminal case but nonetheless when you're choosing jurors in a criminal case, i know impartiality is of the utmost importance when choosing a juror. >> that's why this is a trial like none other because it is designed to have jurors who are the most partial biassed jurors you could ever have that would be totally unacceptable in any article three criminal trial in the judicial system. they were elected for their bias, for their partiality, and that's why those 100 jurors or

whatever you want to call them, sit in those seats. >> danny cevallos, joyce vance, thank you both. >> we're going to talk about the president's defense in the next segment. be ready for that. >> i'll be ready. >> that's your specialty. we're going to dig into the reporting of kamala harris with a potential endorsement for the former vice president. and appears to have gone under the president's skin, we'll tell you why, those stories and a check of weather when we come right back. check or when we come right back. i must admit. i had a few good tricks

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welcome back, everyone, former 2020 contender, kamala harris is reportedly weighing whether she will endorse joe biden for president. "the new york times" reporting according to multiple democrats close to hairharris, she's cons the impact of her endorsement and mindful of amy klobuchar and elizabeth warren.

her relationship with the former vice president became strained after the first primary debate june when she criticized him for his past opposition to school bussing with a little over a week until the start of the primary season, harris's endorsement could give a boost to biden's campaign. harris dropped out last month, and is a considered a front runner for biden pick if he gets the nomination. michael bloomberg's ads which take jabs at the president and air frequently in washington and florida where he is watching the trump grew frustrated on thursday after bloomberg's campaign manager appeared on fox news condemning trump's treatment of military leaders. after seeing the ad, he tweeted, mini mike bloomberg is playing poker with his foot hardy unsuspected democratic rivals. the fact is when mini loses, he will be spending very little of his money on these clowns

because he will consider himself to be the biggest clown of all and he will be right. the associated press jonathan lemire reports as trump has become more focused on the democratic race and was initially irked by bloomberg's entry into the 2020 field, the president has told confidants, the mayor has picked up support and bloomberg has benefitted from a disproportionate amount of positive news stories. trump has continued to hit bloomberg on twitter, obsessing over his private wealth while avoiding the counsel of aides, including son-in-law jared kushner. still ahead, president trump is trying to walk back comments he made about possibly cutting entitlement programs. what he's now saying about social security benefits. that's next. s now saying about social security benefits that's next. how to cover almost anything. even a "gold medal grizzly." (sports announcer) what an unlikely field in this final heat. hang on... you're about to see history in the making.

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and decreased appetite, which lead to dehydration and may worsen kidney problems. i have it within me to lower my a1c. ask your doctor about trulicity. welcome back, president trump tried to walk back on his comments from earlier this week at the world economic forum suggesting he would at some point look at cutting entitlement programs. here's what he said in davos on tuesday. >> entitlements will on your plate. >> at some point they will be. we have tremendous growth. we're going to have tremendous growth this next year. it will be toward the end of the year. the growth is going to be incredible and at the right time we will take a look at that. that's actually the easiest of all things. >> if you're willing to do some of the things you said you wouldn't do in the past in terms of medicare. >> we also have assets that we never had.

we never had growth like this. >> after receiving criticism from democrats for his comments on potentially gutting programs like medicare, medicaid, and social security, the president then tweeted this, democrats are going to destroy your social security. i have totally left it alone as promised and will save it. according to "the new york times," senior administration officials quote insisted that trump was not seeking to make a new policy announcement, however, the paper reports that but is reporting that trump's budget proposal could outline some of the administration's plans for additional tax cuts. the possible cuts, the paper notes, would invariably add to the deficit unless offset with spending cuts or tax increases. let's take a pause from politics and get a quick check of your weather with nbc meteorologist. >> weather can be political sometimes, i feel like. >> it didn't used to be. >> touche. >> good morning, let's track the winter storm, areas in the midwest, a little slippery. winter weather advisory in chicago. this is a march like storm

again. a lot of rain from savannah, georgia, to atlanta, bring the umbrellas out. carolinas are going to get soaked. you can see where the blue is on the map. this shows you where we have snow leftover. kansas city and interstate 70 towards columbia. head toward the quad cities, chicago has been a wintry mixment it wimix. it will turn back over to a little bit of snow. winter weather advisories cover kansas city, quincy, davenport, chicago, and a few areas could get a little sleet this morning on the leading edge of the rain, to boone, and maybe even in the mountains of the poke noconos, snow forecast by january standards, the peak of kwirnwin not very impressive. green bay, northern wisconsin, illinois, not much in ohio, a coating on the grass, and that will be more tomorrow on the backside of the storm. the northeast, the i-95 corridor, no snow at all with the storm system. maybe a little bit in the mountainous areas. even there it looks like rain

for the ski areas come saturday afternoon. here's how it plays out. as we go through the day today, rain moves through detroit, pittsburgh, the rain will arrive for the evening rush hour. dry in raleigh, charlotte will get soaked for the evening rush hour, and saturday, that's when we start to watch the rainfall moving through the east. washington, d.c., heavy rain early saturday throughout the morning, baltimore, philadelphia, and new york city, rain from noon to 6:00 p.m. and doesn't arrive into boston until we get to saturday night, a rainy saturday evening in areas like boston. by the time we get to sunday morning, much of the northeast has cleared out, a little bit of lake effect snow in western new york, snow showers around pittsburgh. overall sunday looks like the better of the two days. for today, enjoy this. 50 degrees in d.c., 48 in new york city. not feeling like the middle of winter at all. the southern half of the country is just fine a little bit of rain in the carolinas and by the time we get to saturday, messy, rainy day in the northeast.

in the middle of winter, rain can be good, get the salt off the roads. >> there's not salt because there's no snow. >> you can talk about miami being 77 degrees. >> l.a. 77 and sunny. >> thanks, bill, appreciate it. thanks for keeping it nonpolitical these days. still ahead, much more from day two, the senate impeachment trial including how democratic prosecutors are addressing the issue of joe biden and his son hunter. the latest on the deadly coronavirus that's causing entire cities in china to go on lock down. we're back in a moment. na to go lock down. we're back in a moment ♪ don't get mad, put those years to work with e*trade. ♪ oh, oh, (announcer)®! ♪ once-weekly ozempic® is helping many people with type 2 diabetes like james lower their blood sugar. a majority of adults who took ozempic®

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welcome back, everyone. i'm ayman mohyeldin alongside yasmin vossoughian. we begin this hatlf hour with more from day two of opening arguments in the senate impeachment trial. democrats rebutted some of the white house's defense of president trump with congressman adam schiff, the lead impeachment prosecutor addressing the theory about efforts to combat corruption in ukraine. >> no one disputes that marie yovanovitch was and is a devoted fighter against corruption. that's her reputation. that was part of the reason they had to get rid of her. you look at that july 25th call, the president is bad mouthing this person fighting corruption. he's praising the former ukrainian prosecutor who's corrupt. are we to really believe this is

about fighting corruption. it wasn't until 2019, after biden emerged as a considerable opponent, after special counsel mueller confirmed that president trump's campaign had welcomed russian assistance in 2016 that president trump, we are to believe, suddenly developed an interest in anti-corruption reforms in ukraine. when given the opportunity to raise the issue of corruption with ukrainians, the president never did. despite the request of his staff, the word corruption never crosses his lips. just the bidens. and crowd strike. >> and impeachment prosecutors defended joe biden against allegations that the former vice president sought to have ukraine's then prosecutor removed to stop an investigation into burisma. >> in short, president trump

asked for the investigation into biden based on a made up theory that no one agreed with. no one. let's be very very clear. vice president biden called for the removal of this prosecutor at the official direction of u.s. policy because the prosecutor was widely perceived as corruption and with the support of all our international allies, common sense would tell us that this allegation against joe biden is false. and if there was no legitimate basis for any investigation. >> however, trump's defenders used that approach to argue that democrats have now made discussion of the bidens fair game in the senate trial. >> what did you think of the long defense of joe biden and the explanation of what he was doing there, getting rid of a corrupt prosecutor. >> what do i think about it, i

think we're going to address a lot of those very issues. we are going to address those issues. the question was raised, they have opened the door. they opened the door, it's now relevant, so we will address the appropriate issues as defense lawyers would. the door has been opened so to speak on that, we will address it appropriately. >> josh hawley tweeted this, wow, house managers make extended argument that biden's work with burisma entirely appropriate and no conflict of interest with joe biden getting rid of prosecutor -- going to need to hear from both bidens. >> president trump has argued that the july 25th discussion with ukraine was a perfect call so lead impeachment prosecutor adam schiff tried to undercut that claim by asking why the white house wasn't forthcoming about what was said between the two leaders. >> no public readout was posted on the white house web site following the july 25th call. i wonder why that was. the white house instead provided

reporters with a short incomplete summary that of course omitted the major elements of that conversation. if the call was perfect, if these investigations were legitimate, if the white house had nothing to hide, then ask yourselves, why did the white house readout omit any mention of these investigations? why not publicly confirm that ukraine had been asked by the president to pursue them? why? because it would have exposed the president's corruption. >> joining us here once again, msnbc legal analyst, danny cevallos, also with us former u.s. attorney for the northern district of alabama and msnbc legal analyst joyce vance. let's get into the idea, danny, first of corruption. the democrats are calling into question the president's real motivation for focussing on corruption first and foremost, also bringing up the fact that in this phone call, the president called victor show kia

good man, and marie yovanovitch, somebody who was combatting on the ground in ukraine. >> they have to focus on this. this is an essential thing. like joyce and i were talking about earlier, one of the things they have to do is address this because it's going to be the core of the defense's argument, that the president lawfully investigated corruption and just because it happens to benefit his political campaign that doesn't e vaviscerate his underlying core power to root out corruption. they have to hammer this home. they did hammer this home, and the reason they have to hammer this home is the crux of the defense's case is going to be that as long as he's rooting out corruption, whatever tangential benefit there is to his own campaign is i wa campaign is imma materiterial, presidents take actions and it might tangentially benefit their

political prospects but when it's this obvious, we have to draw a line. we may not know what the line is, but this has to pass that line. >> i keep saying if joe biden was not running for president, would burisma be a name of a company that we know about. >> would this even be happening. >> exactly. and to that point, the other part of this is that the prosecutors, the house managers on their side, they have been trying to link the president in terms of what he's been doing and saying as a policy as working for or on behalf of russian president vladimir putin. is that a smart strategy do you think? >> you know, i think they have to work with the truth. i mean, there's a very different philosophy going on on the two sides and the democrats are trying to put forward the facts and talk about the truth. there is some implication that this serves russian policy, but the heart of what schiff and the democrats are saying is that presidents shouldn't get involved in decision making about individual criminal cases.

right, that's always been an american policy. and if he thought there was something wrong involving bidens and burisma, then the appropriate thing to do would have been to turn it over to his attorney general and let his attorney general make whatever he could make with it. >> you know what i thought was astounding in that room yesterday was basically when adam schiff paints this picture of vladimir putin and what he's doing right now, and he's in a room, and someone walks in the room and says to vladimir putin, can you believe it they're actually talking about crowd strike. they actually believe the story line of crowd strike and laughing about it, and i thought to myself, there are individuals in this room on this senate floor right now that believe the story about crowd strike. >> right. and you know, something that we know about russia's long-term goals vis-a-vis our country is that their goal is to disrupt our way of life. if trump is a means to that end, well, all the better but their support is not for one candidate in our elections. their support is to disrupt the successful functioning of our country. so all of this in that sense, i

think, schiff is accurate. democratic managers are accurate when they talk about it playing into putin's goals. >> danny, let's look ahead to what we might anticipate this weekend. you saw jay sekulow, the defense strategy is they opened the door, we're going to seize this moment and talk about it. beyond that moment of trying to muddy the water about the corruption issue and the hunter bide issue, what is the overarching strategy of the president's defense team that is going to consume us for the next three days, if they use those three days. >> at least as to article one. that's what we have been talking about the most is that the president, they're going to say, takes lawful actions even if you question the motive, if the overall action is lawful, then it's a lawful exercise of his presidential power. whether it be that he had some other side benefit or something to his benefit, none of that matters. it is a risky argument because you're essentially asking the american people to accept there's a lot of evidence that he did this with a really bad

motive, but you must ignore that because as long as the overarching exercise of power was lawful, you cannot question the motive. and i think that's just a fundamentally stretched argument. >> joyce, we talked a little bit about this off camera, and i want to get into it here in that we talked about the fact that the republicans know how to deliver a sound bite. in spite of the fact that they are not basing their arguments on fact at all, and you in fact had cipollone standing up lying about instances that took place in this time period. they know how to deliver a sound byte. is that effective right now in this medium going forward with regards to their defense? >> you know, i think it is effective, and we have seen the president do it from day one, right. it was a perfect call. those sorts of short encapsulated messages really resonate with the public. >> read the transcript. >> exactly. this is in many ways about the election as it is about impeachment. this is political messaging. it's an effective strategy.

the democrats' job is more difficult. it takes more words, more effort, more sentences -- >> a story line. >> right. and these are complicated facts. they're not simple facts. we saw the mueller report get bogged down because it was hard to explain. it's tough to follow the story of what went on here. >> do you think the prosecutors made a mistake that they brought the hunter biden to joe biden into this process. >> i think they had to do it, and danny made this point earlier, they really short circuited the impact of the defense because by the time sekulow gets up there and cipollone gets up there, at least the democrats have already told the republicans what their answers are. >> quickly danny l it work in the defense's favor to say we're going to do this in two days, that's all the time we need because none of this holds water. >> that's an effective defense strategy sometimes, at least in criminal trials, people don't

realize, often the defense rests without calling any witnesses because they can sit back and say, look, the prosecution has the burden. they haven't met their burden. we don't have to prove anything. you may see a similar strategy, even though the same burdens of proof don't automatically ply in a senate trial, you may see a similar strategy where jay sekulow takes his team and says we're going to condense this, we're not going to give credence to this, we're going to give the bare bones basics and they haven't met their burden. >> danny cevallos, joyce vance, thank you for getting up with us. china's latest efforts to stop the spread of the coronavirus as the u.s. issues the highest travel warning for the city where the disease originated. your first look at "morning joe" is next. we're back in a moment. at "morn" is next. we're back in a moment he wanted a man cave in our new home.

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♪ you got to spread joy up to the maximum ♪ "it's okay, you got this" ♪ bring gloom down to the minimum ♪ "slow it down a little" ♪and have faith, or pandemonium "it's okay" ♪liable to walk upon the scene♪ all right. the state department is urging travelers to avoid the chinese city of wuhan, and its

neighboring cities in what "the new york times" is reporting as the sternest warning the united states government issues regarding travel. other such level four warnings issued by the state department include travel to syria, iraq, amongst other places. this is coming as the chinese coronavirus death toll has jumped to at least 26 people. and sickened at least 835 more. this morning, chinese officials have shut down transportation in at least ten cities with a total of about 33 million people on lock down. a major chinese cities such as beijing and wuhan have cancelled new year's celebrations, banning all large gatherings over the coming new year in an effort to contain the rapidly spreading disease as the death toll increased by more than a half dozen in 24 hours. the wuhan government announced it was building a dedicated hospital with a space of a thousand beds, dedicated to treating patients with the virus, many have been turned away from hospitals due to the

overwhelming amount of patients. >> what a scary sight to imagine 33 million people on lock down. >> unbelievable but you can be comforted in the fact they are doing their due diligence in making sure people take the proper precautions. let's get a quick check on your weather with nbc meteorologist bill karins who last time we spoke had some good news. >> a little bit. >> keep it that way. >> you said 33 million people, right, that's like everyone from new york city to philadelphia. that's crazy. >> and what's also unbelievable -- >> on lock down, can't move. can't leave the city, no trains. >> there is their extended time off. i believe they have a month or so off because of the lunar new year, and yet they can't go or travel. this is the time they would be coming to the united states, traveling around the world, taking time off from school, but they are all on lock down because of this virus now. >> hopefully next week you won't be seeing anything about additional spread. hope it doesn't spread. let's get to the forecast. the areas of concern this morning are in the midwest still, a little bit of rain, a

little bit of snow. i don't think it's going to be horrible. if you're going to the airports today, o'hare will have some delays, possibly, i don't think they will have cancellations. same for st. louis, national included. a period of rain moving through areas like charlotte, especially this afternoon and this evening, again with airport delays being the biggest issue there, and then as we look toward your friday forecast we're going to continue to deal with some areas of snowy travel, especially interstate 70 and 80 as we go throughout this afternoon there. and that won't be too bad either. as far as other concerns we're going to deal with, by the time we get to saturday, i think the airports will be a big problem, especially in the afternoon, traveling in and out of areas like d.c., baltimore in the morning and afternoon going in and out of new york city with the heavy rain. not too many problems with snow, and in the northwest that's where we'll also be seeing approximate. sunday forecast, a little bit of rain for louisiana, mississippi, as usual, and snow showers in northern new england, all our attention will be on the big storm into the west. there's no big cold blast coming. there's no snowstorms coming to areas of the eastern half of the country. it looks like we're going to go

into february nice and quiet. >> can we quickly touch on the major tennis news coming out of australia. >> it is crazy. middle of the night matches. we're into that. >> should we tell the folks. >> coco gauff beating out naomi osaka. 16 years old, the defending champion, beating her out. >> wow, a new generation of tens players for sure. >> squeezing in a sports segment. still ahead -- from me of all people -- still ahead, fico changes that could lower your credit score. and "the new york times" is calling the biggest tax hike ever, those stories driving your business next. ness next. ness next. we dried these shorts with bounce wrinkle guard, and a pair without. the bounce wrinkle guard shorts have fewer wrinkles and static, and more softness. it's the world's first mega sheet that does the job of three dryer sheets. it also comes in unscented. if you don't love bounce wrinkle guard,

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all right. time now for business with a company behind fico scores is changing how they calculate your results. nbc's reporter is with us. how can changes affect credit card holders? >> well, going to affect around 110 million customers, around 80 of those will see scores change up or down more than 20 points. this is affecting people who have fallen behind from loan payments. and david solomon talking to msnbc, a bank within futch letter no longer support people that want credit unless a woman or one person of color because it improves performance. not just a governance issue but

helps increase diversity. not good for big bank wells fargo. and fined $17.5, banned from the banking industry by the regulator, the occ because of that fake account scandal you guys might remember where employees at well fargo opening up accounts to win bonuses. a number of other executives, and one other thing before i go. really strong recommendation on a long read at the "new york times" about a tax heist here in europe. a brit and a new zealander involved, $60 billion essentially stolen from european governments setting up a clever double trading system where they got double refunds from different governments. definitely worth your time. >> sounds like the next hollywood movie there. >> yeah. $60 billion. wow. thanks. and coming up, axios' "one big thing" and coming up on "morning joe," more about the impeachment trial. plus, chuck schumer and one

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joining us with a look at axios a.m., nicholas johnston on set. a lot of people on set. liking this. great to see you. >> a big week. >> talk to us about axios "one big thing"? >> the "one big thing" is witness math. a magic number in the senate of the impeachment trial, it's four. the number of republicans democrats have to get to somehow compel witness testimony. super important. the one thing democrats are counting on to shift the terms of this debate. someone coming through on witness testimony. particularly john bolton they're looking for. change the minds of senate republicans. a list of seven or eight they thought they could turn. talking to a lot of republicans, saying that number is very, very small. probably three. mitt romney, susan collins, lisa murkowski, probably yeses, need one more and can't find it.

>> in the axios situation room, the buncher who is the possible fourth? cory gardner? >> he was on the list, joni ernst, came out publicly saying they won't do it. close ally to mitch mcconnell, tough to see this happen. >> not seeing it happening? >> seeing three, can't find the fourth vote. >> vft confident on murkowski? >> murkowski and collins. >> you know our questions before we ask them? >> magic. >> who told you? >> goodness. hacking our -- >> no comment on that. >> all right. >> so what is the question? >> now throwing us off. give us so far what you're hearing with regards to senate republicans reaction to what they've heard the last couple days from democrats? >> republicans saying two moments that really struck them at sort of hitting the wrong kind of tone. remember, democrats are making this case publicly but also convincing wavering republicans to switch sides. two things we saw talking to senate republicans that struck

them the wrong way. remember jerry nadler came out said that senators who didn't vote for witnesses would be complicit in what the president is doing. that outraged susan collins and lisa murkowski. called that offensive. >> a cover-up. >> right. compelled susan collins in a note to chief justice roberts that led him to admonish jerry nadler. a step too far, and put off by rhetoric congressman schiff has been using. a fine line making sure you can speak to the democratic base and get through to wavering republicans. >> a coverup on national television, a different thing to use it on the senate floor. >> right. reprimanded by the chief justice. >> ask you quickly preparing for the president's defense getting under way tomorrow. what do we expect to hear? the overarching defense theory or strategy? >> key thing to think about in the defense, you won't hear a lot of it. don't expect republicans to use all 24 hours.

similar to the last impeachment of president clinton. defense didn't use a lot of time. a lot of republicans don't want to do this. a quick time. nobody wants to watch this on a saturday. >> give us prediction of timing on this thing? >> they don't get the votes on witnesses, could be over in a little, about a week. >> wow. end of next week? >> make that number four so important. >> all right. always a pleasure. great seeing you. of course, reading axios a.m. in a little bit. sign up for the newsletter at signup@axios.com. that does it for us this morning. i'm yasmin vossoughian alongside ayman mohyeldin. "morning joe" starts right now. in your book "the america you deserve" you propose raising social security retirement age to 70. is that still your plan? >> not anymore. i want to take money back from other countries killing us and save social security. we're going to save it without increases. we're not going to raise the age and it will be just fine.

>> entotalments ever on your plate? >> at some point they will be's we have tremendous growth. >> so donald trump favored changes to entitlements before claiming he didn't anymore. before he did again, and now he says he doesn't. if strong-arming ukraine doesn't get republicans attention, perhaps that will. good morning. and welcome to "morning joe." it is friday, january 24th. with us we have caolumn columni "usa today" opinion columnist and senior adviser for the house oversight committee, and former chief of staff to the cia and department of defense now an nbc news national security analyst is with us. and, joe, that's often what the president does when he says something. he just says, he didn't say it. that's where we are. >>